What’s Going On: Evening News Roundup
Posted on September 18th, 2008 by ecthompson
Here’s the Thursday evening news roundup:
- The Dow Jones Industrial Average roller coaster continues. The Dow gained 410 points today. The Federal Reserve and other major banks offered almost $200 billion for the markets. This will allow banks to borrow more money. It should ease some of the credit crunch.
- Steven Levitt, author of Freakonomics, invited a couple of economics professors to explain what is going on with Lehman Brothers, Bear Stearns, Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac along with AIG. It is a relatively long and detailed discussion, though somewhat enlightening.
- Putnam investments has closed a $12.3 billion fund in order to limit losses to its investors. This can’t be good.
- Republican presidential nominee John McCain seems to be somewhat confused about Spain and Latin America. His answer to an interviewer’s question simply didn’t make sense.
- John McCain continues to flounder on the economy. Today he said if he were president, he would fire the SEC Chairman. It turns out, although the SEC chairman position is independent, although nominated by the president and confirmed by Congress. Therefore, the president cannot fire him or her. Oops! One would figure that McCain would know this since he has been in Congress for over 26 years and has been a part of the selection process at least two or three times.
- Governor Sarah Palin seems to be digging herself a large hole called Trooper-gate. Neither her or her husband will testify. I guess if you are a Republican, then answering a subpoena is not in your DNA. For a party that swears they do not like lawyers, they sure seem to use a lot of lawyers in their efforts to delay and to stall.
- Brother, can you spare a dime? Or how about a couple of trillion dollars?. Bailouts may cost about that. Now, where is that going to come from?
- The featured speaker at a GOP rally designed to reach out to minorities is none other than former Senator George Allen. Allen lost his re-election bid to Jim Webb partly due to his racial comments — “Macaca.” Seriously.
I think Trooper/Tasergate may turn in her favor as some of the facts get out.
1. A trooper that taser’s a 10 year old probably shouldn’t be a trooper
2. Yet, the trooper hasn’t been fired even though his boss was fired.
Anyway, if this becomes a case of Palin versus the trooper, she could end up looking pretty good.
If she and the McCain camp think that she will look good in the long run then why is she fighting this tooth and nail?
I admit I haven’t focused on trooper-gate. There are only 24 hours in the day. So, enlighten me.
Turf. She fired a political appointee. Any executive would not subject the hiring and firing of politaical appointees to legislative approval.
I’m should that we are going to get more data in the coming days. Perhaps you are right.